


The World Beneath the Stars

by SharkbaitHooHaHa



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, But who's keeping track, Childhood Friends, Friends to Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Friends to Lovers, I promise, Keith is a human, Lance is a star, M/M, Slow Burn, Will have a happy ending, actually it's more like, angst in later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-10
Updated: 2016-08-21
Packaged: 2018-08-07 22:31:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7732216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SharkbaitHooHaHa/pseuds/SharkbaitHooHaHa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Why do stars fall?”</p><p>“Because some foolhardy human stole their heart.”</p><p> <i>A Klance fairy tale. Keith loved the stars. He never imagined that one might love him back.</i></p><p>ON INDEFINITE HIATUS</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. When You Wish Upon a Star

**Author's Note:**

> This wasn't actually written for Klance week, but when I saw that today's theme had to do with stars, I thought I'd go ahead and post the first chapter, since it fits. Enjoy!

The stars were disappearing from the sky.

No one really knew why. The top scientists worked endlessly to come up with an explanation, but all the answers they found were just meant to calm the voices who attributed it to an approaching apocalypse. And still, the stars kept fading. Usually it was just a few at a time, but sometimes whole clusters would blink out all at once, leaving gaping holes where they had once shone.

Keith had a theory, but he was all of ten years old, and he knew how people would laugh if he gave voice to the nagging suspicion that swirled around his mind. So, he kept quiet, and stared up at the sky night after night, counting stars until he fell asleep. There were still enough that he couldn't count them all, even if he stayed awake all night, and that alone was a comfort, although a small one.

Keith had inherited his love of the stars from his mother. She looked at the night sky, and saw another world, full of wonder and magic and she passed that on to her son.

“Make a wish,” she would tell him. “For the stars are the protectors of dreams. If you ever lose your way and forget what it was you were aiming for, they will help you remember. But they won't know what you need to be reminded of if you don't trust them with all your hopes, first. So, make a wish.”

His earliest memories are of her holding him tightly in her lap, tracing the constellations with her finger and reciting their names. He didn't remember the constellations anymore. He barely remembered _her_ , the way she looked, what her voice sounded like, the way she smelled. But what he did remember were her stories. Tales about how people's wishes soared up the heavens and became light. Long ago, she said, everyone held magic in their hearts, and the sky was filled with millions upon millions of stars. But, as people stopped beholding the wonders in life, they forgot how to wish, and the stars began to fade.

“Mama?” Keith had asked. “If people forgot about magic, why can't we just remind them?”

His mother had smiled sadly. “People can't be told about magic, my little dreamer. They have to feel it.”

After he lost his mother, the stars became the one constant in Keith's world, as he became used to a life of upheaval, moving from foster family to foster family. Even when the clouds covered them, he knew they were still there, listening, just waiting to gather up his wishes. He gazed up at the stars every night, finding more friends in them than in the ever changing groups of kids he met at each of his schools.

His favorite star was one that shone high in the winter night sky. It was a small star, much smaller than the ones surrounding it, and it pulsed dimmer that any other. In fact, some nights it couldn't be seen at all. But that was what Keith liked about it best. No matter how matter how many nights it went away, it always returned, shining proudly as if to say 'I did it! I'm here!' Looking at it made Keith believe that if that little star could continue to shine, braving the seemingly overwhelming darkness, then anything might be possible, and maybe the world could find magic again.

He made a point to send his favorite star wishes every time he found it, twinkling high in the sky. Usually they were something small, like 'I wish to have ice cream tomorrow' or 'I wish it would snow.'

However, one night when he was staring up at the night sky, he watched a whole cluster of stars shimmer out of existence. In a panic, he climbed out of his bed and rushed to the window, searching desperately for his favorite star. He found the place where it should be and held his breath, until at last it sent a pulse into the night sky. He let out the air in his lungs with a 'whoosh' as he watched the star steadily flash above him.

He closed his eyes, and let his forehead rest against the glass. “Please,” he whispered desperately to the little star. “Please don't leave me.” Remembering himself, he reworded the plea into the form of a wish. He thought of the pain of moving from home to home, of never knowing how to let his guard down long enough to make friends, of never really feeling like he belonged anywhere, and he poured it all into that desperate wish.

“ _I wish I didn't always have to feel so alone.”_

* * *

 

“Class, I'd like you all to welcome our new student,” the teacher announced early before school started the next day. “Would you like to introduce yourself to the class?”

Keith's interest was piqued enough for him to lift his head from his book. He had been the new student just a few short months ago, and he wasn't expecting to escape the role so quickly.

The boy who stood at the front of the class room didn't seem at all shy having the eyes of the entire class on him. He had tan skin and dark brown hair and probably wouldn't have stood out too much, if not for his clothes. He wore a loose, flowing shirt (tunic?) that was of a strange material that seemed to be made from the night sky itself. It shimmered between black, blue and silver as the light caught it. His pants were plain black with white stripes running down the sides, giving them an almost regal look. Atop his head, he wore a headband of thin, spindly pieces of gold wire interconnected by white pearls. All in all, he looked horribly out of place, and Keith could already hear the other kids whispering among themselves and hiding laughter behind their hands.

The new kid either didn't notice or didn't care. He just grinned widely and lifted a hand to wave to the class. “Hi!” he said, with far more enthusiasm than anyone who was about to start their first day at a new school had any right having. “I'm Lance!”

The class stopped whispering long enough to chorus out a 'hello, Lance,' and just like that, everyone seemed to lose interest in the strangely dressed new boy and their conversations returned to recalling what they had done over the weekend or what new movies they were excited to go see.

The teacher busied herself with looking at the seating chart. “Alright, Lance, it looks like there's an empty seat right over- Lance?”

Ignoring the teacher, Lance marched over to the vacant seat next to Keith and plopped down. “Hi!” he said to Keith, sticking out a hand to shake. “I'm Lance.”

Keith stared at the offered hand and then up at Lance. “You literally just said that.” He was beginning to wonder if this kid was a robot. A happy robot who could only say 'hi, I'm Lance.'

Lance drew his hand back and frowned (pouted.) “I know that,” he said, a blush forming on his cheeks. “I was giving you a chance to introduce yourself.” Was he sulking now? Just how fast would his moods change?

Before Keith could introduce himself, he was interrupted by the teacher, who stood over them both. “Lance, honey,” she said, bending down to be eye level with Lance. “Someone else is already assigned to this seat. You can go sit in the vacant seat in the back.”

Lance blinked. “But I want to sit next to Keith.”

“Uh, well.” The teacher didn't seem to know what to say to that. She straightened up with a sigh. “I guess you can sit there for today, and if Sadie doesn't mind, you two can switch seats tomorrow.”

As the teacher walked back to the front, Keith stared hard at Lance.

“What?” Lance asked.

Keith glared at Lance suspiciously. “I never told you my name.”

Lance looked steadily back at Keith. “I heard it when the teacher did roll call.”

Keith narrowed his eyes. “Then why did you want me to introduce myself?”

Lance stuck his nose in the air and sniffed. “It's the polite thing to do.”

Keith seethed. He had barely known this kid for a minute, and already he was getting on his every last nerve. “You-” Keith opened his mouth to rattle off an insult, but was interrupted when the teacher clapped her hands together to begin class. Keith was left to spend the rest of the morning silently fuming to himself.

It wasn't until lunch that they spoke again. As everyone was gathering their lunch boxes and lining up to head down to the cafeteria, one of the other boys in class walked up to Lance and leaned over the desk, so that he was invading Lance's personal space.

“Hey, new kid,” the other boy spoke, a sneer in his tone. “Why's your shirt all covered in glitter?”

Lance, seemingly unaware the he was being made fun of, held out his arms so that the fabric of his top spread out. “It's not glitter. I like it cause it looks like the stars!”

The other boy snickered. “Whatever, Star Boy. What about that cheesy headband, then, huh?”

Lance reached up and adjusted the headband. “It's a crown!”

“A crown?” The other boy scoffed. “What are you, a girl?”

Lance proudly put his hands on his hips and puffed out his chest. “I'm a prince!”

“Prince of what, the freaks?” The other boy rolled his eyes. Lance opened his mouth to reply, but the other boy raised a hand to shush him and straightened up. “Whatever, I'm over this.” He left to go stand in line.

Keith gathered his things and followed the other kids to the cafeteria. On the way, he found himself standing behind Lance. After several moments of debating himself over whether or not it was worth starting a conversation, curiosity finally got the best of him. “Why _do_ you dress like that, anyway?”

Lance glanced at him over his shoulder, a frown twisting at his mouth. “What do you mean?”

“Are you kidding?” Keith asked incredulously. “That kid was making fun of you. Are you really telling me you couldn't tell?”

Lance's blinked, confused. “He was? Why?'

“Because! Your clothes! They're... weird.”

Lance's frown deepened and Keith felt a twinge of guilt nudge at the pit of his stomach. “Oh,” Lance said, plucking at the fabric of his shirt. “Okay.”

As they walked the rest of the distance to the cafeteria in silence, Keith could feel the guilt swelling up inside him, as if trying to suffocate him. “Look,” he said, stopping Lance before they could enter the lunchroom. He made a point of avoiding eye contact as he scuffed his heel against the carpet, trying to figure out what to say. He settled for, “That guy's a jerk anyway,” and it seemed to do the trick, because Lance's face lit up with that damn goofy grin again.

Keith huffed out a sigh of annoyance, and walked through the large double doors, taking his usual seat alone at the table in the corner. Or so he thought. Lance took the seat next to Keith, smiling obliviously in response to Keith's glare. “What are you doing?” Keith asked.

“Sitting with you,” Lance replied, the implied 'duh' practically dripping from his words.

“ _Why?_ ” Keith demanded.

“Because.”

Keith couldn't tell if Lance was being impudent on purpose, or if it was just something that came naturally for him. He was about to tell Lance to scram and go find somewhere else to sit when he noticed something unusual. “Where's your lunch?”

Lance shrugged. “Don't have one.”

“You didn't bring a lunch on your first day of school?”

Lance just shrugged again.

Keith sighed and opened his lunch box. He pulled out a sandwich and thrust half towards Lance. “Here,” he said, resolutely staring at the opposite wall as he took a bite of his own half.

Lance hesitated. “Are you sure?”

Keith grunted as he chewed. “Just take it before I change my mind.”

Lance took the sandwich and took a small bite. Immediately his eyes widened and he turned to Keith, a smile lighting up his face. “Dude,” he said, repeatedly slapping his palm against Keith's arm in excitement. “Dude!”

Keith swatted his hand away. “Stop hitting me. What's your deal?”

Lance waved the sandwich in front of Keith's face. “This is the most amazing thing ever!”

Keith stared at him blankly. “It is literally just four piece of cheese between two slices of bread.”

Lance looked at the sandwich reverently. “Cheeeeese,” he repeated in awe.

“Are you seriously telling me you've never had a cheese sandwich before?”

“I've never had _anything_ before.”

Keith shook his head. “You are so weird.”

Lance spent the rest of lunch nibbling on his cheese sandwich, savoring every last crumb. Each bite was accompanied by lots of 'mmming' and 'nomming' noises until Keith threatened to physically eject him from the cafeteria if he didn't stop.

By the time recess came around, Keith was ready to ditch Lance and go off and read on the grass by himself, like he always did.

Lance, however, had no intention of letting that happen. “Race you to the other side of the playground.”

Keith scoffed. “Why would I want to do tha- Hey!” he cried, as Lance took off running. Keith chased after him, shouting all the way. “You can't start early, it's not fair!”

* * *

 

And that was pretty much how Keith and Lance's relationship progressed. The next day, when Lance came to school, he had ditched his strange clothes from the day before, opting instead for a simple blue sweater/khakis combination that seemed strangely reminiscent of Keith's red sweater/khakis outfit from the day before. Sadie had also come back and decided that she didn't mind switching seats at all, so, much to Keith's irritation, Lance got to keep his seat next to Keith.

Lance took every opportunity to goad Keith into some ridiculous challenge, and somehow, despite Keith's better judgment, he always managed to fall for it. Lance was competitive in nature, and Keith was never one to back down from a challenge. All it took was a smirk from Lance, and suddenly Keith found himself doing the most idiotic things, like seeing who could get hit by the most dodge balls, or who could circle more 'b' answers on their test without flunking, or who could eat so many gummi bears that they had to get sent to the nurse's office (they tied on that one.)

They weren't necessarily friends in the traditional sense, but Lance was the closest thing that Keith had, and Keith tried not to dwell on that too much. And if Keith, while making his lunch every morning, forgoing the lunch meat his foster parents were trying to get him to eat to opt for a simple cheese sandwich instead, ended up somehow making an extra one 'accidentally' every day, well, that didn't mean anything either.

They were opposites in practically every way. Keith was quiet and reserved, whereas Lance was open and shone brightly, lighting up the world with his warmth. Others were drawn to him as if he had a sort of gravity. It only took a few days for people to forget about his weird clothes and stop making fun of him, and within a week it seemed he had befriended almost every kid in the school. Even the kid who had mockingly called him 'Star Boy' now shouted out the nickname as an enthusiastic greeting whenever Lance entered the room.

Keith assumed that once Lance realized that Keith wasn't like him, that he was an outcast among the other kids, he would lose interest and leave him alone again. But it never happened. Lance, for reasons that baffled Keith, seemed determined to keep pestering Keith. When they were at school, the two could be found together at least ninety percent of the time. And sure, the two spent most of that time arguing and constantly trying to one-up the other, but Keith found that within a few short weeks he had grown accustomed to Lance's presence.

One day, though, just barely over a month since Lance's arrival, Keith came in to find the desk next to his completely empty. Keith assumed Lance was just running late. The kid was scattered enough that it wouldn't be a surprise. However, the day progressed and Lance did not appear. Nor did he show up the next day. Or the day after that.

After a week with still no sign from Lance, Keith was beginning to think that maybe he had seen the last of the boy. The bitterness he felt towards that idea surprised him.

Keith found himself unable to sleep that night. He lay awake long after his foster parents had gone to bed, resenting Lance for not saying goodbye, and resenting himself from caring. As he stared out the window at the night sky, he caught sight of his favorite star.

“ _I wish Lance would come back._ ” The wish whispered it's way past his lips before he had even realized he had thought it. Grumbling to himself about how stupid it all was, he rolled over the face the wall, and tried to remind himself how much simpler his life had been before Lance had crashed haphazardly into it. 

He was startled from his thoughts by a soft _plinking_ sound. He sat up and looked around the room, trying to determine the source of the noise. A moment later it sounded again and Keith could have sworn it came from his window. He stared at it, wondering why on earth it would be making that noise.

His question was answered when a moment later, a small rock flung itself out of the darkness to bounce off the glass.

Curious, Keith got out of bed and cautiously tiptoed to the window. Peering out, he groaned in exasperation and rested his head against the glass, a small huff of laughter escaping his lips at the sight of what was below.

Lance stood on his driveway throwing rocks at his window. When he caught Keith looking at him, he waved both of his arms over his head, a large grin spreading across his face.

Keith opened his window and poked his head out. “You know you're some sort of horrible walking cliché, right?”

Lance raised his hands in offense. “What are you talking about, I've seen people do this in movies a million times!”

Keith chuckled. “Yeah, no one actually does this in real life.”

“Rude!” Lance balled his hands into fists by his side and stomped his foot on the cement, looking every bit the petulant child Keith knew him to be.

“Shh! You'll wake the Nelsons." Keith sighed begrudgingly. "Hang on a moment, I'll be right down." He ducked his head back through the window and slid it shut. Grabbing his jacket off his desk chair, he silently crept out of his room and down the stairs. As he made his way outside, he gently pulled the front door closed behind him.

Lance bounded over to him like an eager puppy and Keith rolled his eyes. "What do you want?"

"Come on," Lance said excitedly, tugging at his arm. "I want to show you something!"

Keith pulled his arm out of Lance's grip. "What? Now? It's a school night."

"Aw, come on!" Lance pouted.

"No."

"What's the matter? Afraid you'll get caught sneaking out?" Lance taunted, waggling his eyebrows in a challenge.

As always, Keith took the bait. Sparing one last backward glance at the house, he snorted. "Don't be an idiot. Where are we going?"

Lance started walking down the street and beckoned for Keith to follow. “This way.”

Keith shoved his hands in his jacket pockets and trotted after him. “Where the heck have you been, anyway?” he asked, trying to keep the question nonchalant and not give away how much Lance's absence had actually bothered him.

Lance shrugged. “Away,” he answered simply.

Keith ground his teeth and dug his hands deeper in his pockets. “That's all your going to give me?” he grumbled, sounding more hurt than he intended.

Lance stopped in his tracks and turned to face him, and uncharacteristically serious look on his face. “I'm sorry,” he said, guilt written across his face, as if he knew how much him leaving had affected Keith. “It's just... It's personal, okay?”

Keith shrugged, trying to seem unaffected. “Yeah, okay. I get it.”

“Man, oh man, though,” Lance said as the two started walking again. “My mom was so mad when I got back. I'm talking seriously PO'd.”

Keith cocked his head to the side. “You ran away from home?”

“No, no. Well, I mean, I _did_ , sorta, but that wasn't what she was mad about. I kinda...” Lance rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “I kinda stole something.” He shot a furtive glance in both directions, as if expecting someone to jump out of a bush and yell 'GOTCHA' at them. Then, with great flourish, he reached into the front of his shirt and pulled out a small pendant attached to a gold chain around his neck.

Keith leaned in to get a closer look. It was a small, glass teardrop with thin gold wire spiraling down around it, and there were two flat, petal shaped pieces of gold curling off either side of the top. It was filled with what appeared to be some kind of liquid glitter, swirling around and catching reflections to send off shimmers of gold, silver, and white. It almost looked like it was glowing, though from what light source, Keith couldn't quite place.

“What is it?” Keith asked.

“It's stardust,” Lance said proudly, tucking the pendant back into his shirt.

“What, like from space?”

“No, from the stars!” Lance corrected.

Keith stared at him blankly. “Soooo... from space?”

Lance shot him a glare. “Aren't you even listening?”

“Yeah, you're just not making any sense.” Keith paused. “Wait, if you got in trouble for stealing it, then why do you still have it?”

“Well, after a very long lecture about how what I did was wrong, and I should never do it again, and then a bunch of other things that I tuned out-”

“Typical.”

“-She said that since I had done it, I had a responsibility to finish what I started.”

“Which is?”

Lance spun around so that he was walking backwards, his face split into a mischievous grin. “That's a sec-ret,” he said, holding one finger in front of his lips and giving an exaggerated wink. He turned back around and stopped so suddenly that Keith nearly ran into him.

They had come to stand in front of a large park. Keith had walked by it many times on the way to school, but had never entered it.

“We're here!” Lance announced.

Keith raised an eyebrow at Lance. “This is where you wanted to bring me?”

“Drop the negative attitude, dude!” Lance flapped his hand as if he could wave away Keith's skepticism. “We're not there yet.”

“But you just said-”

“I know what I said!” Lance stomped off into the park and Keith followed.

They followed the path for a while, then Lance suddenly made a turn into a cluster of trees. Keith, caught by surprise, jogged lightly to catch up. After a few minutes they emerged at the bottom of a lightly sloped grassy hill. When they reached the top, Lance threw himself down onto the grass, patting the spot next to him to indicate that Keith should do the same.

Keith carefully sat down and looked around. “Okay, so why are we here?”

“'Why are we here?'” Lance leaned back on his elbows and grinned. “Just check out this view, man!”

It was indeed impressive. The hilltop came out just above the tops of the trees surrounding it and you could see around for miles. The lights of the city lit up the horizon and it reminded Keith of the night sky.

He was about to comment on the beauty when he caught sight of Lance in the corner of his eye and his breath caught in his throat. There was a bright, golden light coursing through the other boy's body. It started at his chest and bloomed outward rhythmically, like some sort of heart beat. It radiated from the inside, fading away as it got further from Lance's core, but not before sending little lines of light dancing and skittering across his skin.

Mesmerized, Keith turned his head to get a better look, but as soon as he did, the light vanished. Disappointed, Keith turned his head this way and that, trying to find the right angle to make the vision reappear.

Lance saw him looking and turned his head and smiled. “Well? What do you think?”

Keith cleared his throat, embarrassed at having been caught. “You brought me here to... look at the city?”

Lance rolled his eyes. “Not that view.” He pointed towards the sky. “That one.”

Keith looked up and couldn't help the audible gasp that escaped his lips. Though the city lights dotted the horizon on the distance, they were far enough away from them in the middle of the park that the darkness gave them a glimpse of quite a few more stars than Keith could see from the little window in his room.

It was like looking at a tapestry with threads of pure light stitched into it. The stars danced across the night sky in streaks that swirled within themselves before scattering across the night. All the answers to every question on the universe were right there spread out before them, and Keith could have the all if he could just reach out and touch them.

Suddenly, he felt so incredibly small and insignificant, and yet boundless and eternally relevant in the same breath. He was both a single blip on the radar of the universe and a rock that diverged the flow of time.

Sitting there with Lance on that hill, he felt something shift within him, like the walls of his carefully formed facade were cracking. He felt like they had become a part of something infinite, him and this strange, confusing boy, that he didn't quite know whether or not to call a friend. Like the first piece of something greater was clicking into place. Together or apart, they could accomplish anything. They were in on the secrets of the universe. They were masters of fate. They were endless.

It was breathtaking. It was awe-inspiring. It was lonely.

The stars had looked down on the world for so long, how could Keith or any of his dreams matter to them?

“Wow,” Keith breathed, once the wave of emotions overwhelming him calmed down. “I had no idea there were so many.”

“Yeah.” Lance smiled, but then his expression turned troubled. “But not as many as there used to be.”

“It's because people don't wish upon stars anymore.” The words was out before Keith could stop them. It was the theory that he never dared to speak aloud for fear at what people would do if they found out. He had witnessed firsthand the stigma that chased people who believed in magic. There as no room for it in the world anymore, and people seemed to have forgotten that it ever existed.

He sucked in a breath and bit his lip, glancing over to Lance, steeling himself for the ridicule. But it never came.

Instead, Lance sighed and nodded. “Yeah.”

Keith blinked in surprise. He had never met anyone else who would openly admit to believing and he wasn't quite sure how to react to this new information.

Luckily, he was saved from having to say anything by Lance asking, “Do you want to make a wish now?”

Keith blinked. “I...Uh...” he stuttered.

“It doesn't have to be anything big. A small one is fine, too.”

Keith gazed up at the stars and frowned. “I can't.” (His wish had already came true that night.) “My favorite star isn't out.”

Lance turned his head to look at Keith. “Your favorite star?”

“Yeah, uh...” Keith blushed. “It was out earlier, but now it's not. It's the only star I wish on.”

“How can you possibly have a favorite star, though? There are so many. How do you choose?”

Keith jutted his chin out defiantly. “It's special. Sometimes it can't be seen, but it's always there. It's persistent like that.”

“It sounds weak,” Lance whispered, a sad note to his voice that Keith barely picked up on. “How do you know it hasn't faded?”

Keith whipped his head to face Lance. “Don't say that!” he growled. “It'll come back. It _always_ comes back!”

Lance held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Hey, whoah, I'm sorry, I didn't mean anything by it.”

They sat there in silence until Lance eventually dosed off. Keith sleepily ran a hand down his face and pushed himself off the ground. He nudged Lance with his foot and the other boy jolted awake with a snort.

“Come on,” Keith said. “We should go.”

Lance stood up with a yawn and stretched his arms up over his head. He looked around blearily and rubbed the palm of his hand against his eyelids. “Whattimeisit?” he slurred sleepily.

“Time to go,” Keith replied.

Lance groaned, and then draped his larger figure over Keith's back, and Keith squawked in protest.

“Keith, can you carry me?” Lance mumbled.

“Get off of me!” Keith shoved Lance off of him and began stomping down the hill. “Carry yourself!”

“Keeeeeeiiiiith,” Lance whined, chasing him. “That not even possible! Keith? Keith, wait for me!”


	2. Colliding

Lance and Keith developed a habit of stargazing together after that night.

Keith was thrilled to meet someone else who loved the stars, even if that someone was _Lance_ of all people, and Keith found himself actively looking forward to their meetings. He would sneak out after he was sure the Nelsons were already asleep and run down to the park to find Lance waiting for him on hilltop. They would stay there for at least an hour, sometimes spending it in silence, sometimes sharing stories.

Keith would repeat the stories his mother had told him about people whose lives were changed by wishing on stars, and Lance would share fairy tales about a kingdom in the sky and a castle made of a brilliant white light. He told him that the citizens of this kingdom were the stars in the sky, and that they collected peoples' wishes on golden scrolls and kept them safe in a huge vault and used the magic from the wishes to look after the World Beneath the Stars and keep it safe and keep its people happy.

The way Lance talked about that place made it feel so vibrant and real that Keith could just about picture himself there.

Those became the nights that Keith liked best, when he could lay in the grass and listen to Lance talk about grand balls, about ships sailing across the night sky, about a faraway world where it seemed anything was possible. And occasionally, if he was lucky, he could catch a fleeting glimpse of the light that shone deep within Lance, and the way it coiled and twirled through his veins never failed to dazzle him.

Sometimes, Lance would disappear for a week at a time, just like he had right before the first night he brought Keith to the hilltop. On those nights, Keith lay on the grass alone, talking to his favorite star instead. He was beginning to notice that each time it appeared in the sky, though those times were becoming rarer, it shone brighter and brighter, and no longer fell into the darkness on each twinkle as it used to.

“It's weird, isn't it?” Lance said one night after returning from one of his absences.

“Hmm?” Keith mumbled, only half paying attention.

“How far away the stars are.” Lance reached a hand up towards the sky and stretched out his fingers, as if he could touch it if he only reached far enough.

“Of course they're far away.”

“I know, but...” Lance dropped his hand. “I just thought it would be a lot closer, is all,” he mumbled.

Keith turned his head towards Lance, puzzled. “What are you talking about?”

“Nothing.” Lance sighed and tucked his hands behind his head. “Forget about it.”

* * *

Keith learned a lot about Lance on that hilltop.

He learned that he came from a large family, and as such, he was not used to being alone. Even there on the hilltop, with just the two of them, was far less company than Lance was accustomed to. The nights where they sat together without a word spoken between them were few and far in between, as Lance supplied a never-ending stream of chatter to fill the void left by the silence. And even though he often told Lance to shut up, Keith really didn't mind.

He learned that Lance's family, for reasons he wouldn't get into, lived far away. When Keith asked him what he was doing here by himself, Lance launched into this ridiculous story about how he was a visiting prince from a far away land here on a secret mission.

Keith rolled his eyes. “And what mission is that exactly?”

Lance lifted his head from the grass to look at Keith. “You don't remember?”

He learned that Lance wasn't living with any family, as Keith had assumed. When he asked him where he was staying instead, Lance would always grin and answer 'Oz,' or 'Neverland,' or 'in an enchanted forest.'

Things were always this way with Lance. He covered his loneliness with wide grins and hid his insecurities with jokes. Keith felt like the more he learned about Lance, the less he really knew. On the one hand, he was an open book. He wore his heart on his sleeve and his emotions were easy to read, even the ones he masked. But on the other hand, there were moments when getting a straight answer from him was comparable to trying to take a chew toy from a dog.

Time passed as a blur, and the days blended together. Before either of them knew it, the school year had ended and turned into summer. Keith had long ago resigned himself to spending it hiding alone in his room and reading, as he had in summers past.

Lance, it seemed, had other ideas.

The first day of summer, as Keith was lying belly first on the floor and debating whether to reread his favorite book for the eleventh time or give something new a try, the doorbell rang.

Both the Nelson's were at work and Keith was home alone, so he decided that whoever it was would have to come back later. That was, until the doorbell rang again. And again. And again and again and again.

Annoyed at the interruption, Keith put down the books and stomped down the stairs. He just wanted to get rid of whoever was at the door so he could go back to reading in peace.

He opened the door, already prepared with what to say. “Whatever you're selling, there isn't anyone here who-” He stopped short.

Lance stood on the front step, a bicycle helmet tucked under one arm. “Wanna ride down to the ice cream shop?” he asked with a grin.

“Uh...” Keith stared back at him blankly.

Lance was honestly the last person he expected to see when he opened the door. They spent a lot of time together on the hilltop, sure, but aside from that, all their time together was spent arguing. Keith wasn't actually sure if Lance even liked him.

Lance was still staring at him, waiting for an answer, so Keith blushed and said sheepishly. “I don't actually have a bike.” He shuffled his feet awkwardly. “Thanks... for the invite, though?”

Lance didn't seem put down. “Don't worry about it! We can both ride mine!”

Keith waited for Lance to throw his head back and laugh and say 'just kidding,' but after a few moments it became clear that Lance was one hundred percent serious. “Uh... what?”

“Yeah,” Lance said nodding. “You can sit on my handlebars!”

“That sounds... extremely reckless. Even for you.”

“Nah, it'll be fine!” Lance gave him a proud thumbs up. “I'm an excellent bike rider.”

* * *

Lance was a _terrible_ bike rider.

They careened down the street towards the ice cream shop, swerving this way and that, nearly falling over on multiple occasions. Keith held on for dear life, one hand on the handlebar, the other reaching back to grip the sleeve of Lance's jacket.

Lance had insisted that Keith wear the helmet, citing 'safety first' as he strapped it onto a reluctant Keith's head. Keith was fairly certain it wouldn't do him any good, though, as the speeds Lance was riding at were dangerous enough even without his weight on the handlebars putting the bike off-balance.

Miraculously, they both made it to the ice cream shop in one piece. Keith dismounted onto shaking legs, and ripped the helmet from his head, letting it clatter to the pavement as he struggled to regain his breath. “You are. The worst. Bike rider. EVER,” he ground out through gritted teeth.

“We got here, didn't we?” Lance leaned the bike against the wall of the ice cream shop, checking his watch as he did so. “And, hey! In record time, too!”

“Never again,” Keith said, glaring hard at Lance, as if he were trying to burn a hole through his head.

“Aw, don't be so-”

“Never. Again.”

Lance blew a raspberry at Keith. “Spoilsport.”

They ended up racing to see who could eat their ice cream the fastest, and then they both spent the next hour lying on a bench, their stomachs aching, and unable to move.

The ride home went a lot smoother, with Keith pedaling this time while a sulking Lance sat on the handlebars and pouted, the unbuckled helmet sitting crooked on his head.

* * *

The rest of the summer passed in pretty much the same way. Lance would show up unannounced on Keith's doorstep and drag him off to do some dumb, often dangerous activity. One day, Lance showed up with a basketball, claiming that he knew how to play, even though he absolutely did _not_ know how to play, though neither did Keith, so they haphazardly threw the ball around the court until Lance got hit in the face and ended up with a bloody nose. Another day, he showed up with a skate board, and they took turns sitting on it and going down the steep hill by the school until Keith fell off and scraped up not only his elbows and his knees, but his chin as well. Yet another day, he showed up with nothing at all, but they both ended up falling out of the same tree after the branch they were sitting on broke.

And so it went, and Keith, who had been so set on spending the entire summer with his books, found himself faced with an unexpected loneliness on the weeks that Lance disappeared.

The hottest day of summer found Keith and Lance sitting on opposite sides of a giant tree, soaking up the shade. It was far too hot to get into any sort of mischief, so instead they were splitting a box of popsicles in an attempt to stay cool.

As Keith looked back on the summer this far, he realized that he had seen Lance every day, except on the ones where Lance mysteriously vanished.

After a long debate with himself over whether or not he should point it out, he spoke up. “Hey... Lance?”

“Mm?” Lance responded, only half paying attention as he opened another popsicle.

“Why are you here?”

Lance bit the top off the popsicle. “Becauth it'th, like, ovah a hundwed degwees out, man,” he mumbled around the flavored ice in his mouth.

“No, I mean,” Keith hesitated. “Wouldn't you rather hang out with someone else? You're friends with, like, everyone in class.”

Lance laughed. “Are you kidding? Who else would agree to go canoeing with me and then sink my boat when they fell out of theirs?”

“You pushed me!”

Lance laughed harder. “Dude, it was just a little nudge! How was I to know you have such terrible balance?”

“We got banned from the lake!”

“Oh, they didn't actually _mean_ that.”

“They made fliers with our pictures and posted them at all the boat rentals!”

“Okay, so maybe they were _kinda_ serious.”

Keith sighed in annoyance. “Look, what I'm trying to ask is, why wouldn't you rather hang out with your friends?”

Lance pushed himself away from the tree, to lean around and look at Keith. “But _we're_ friends.” He hesitated, suddenly looking incredibly self-conscious. “Aren't we?”

Keith opened his mouth to reply and then immediately shut it. He had thought he had been so certain, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the answer was 'no.' Keith didn't have friends, and it was as plain and simple as that. But somehow, with the introduction of Lance into his life, everything that he had once been so sure of had been completely overridden, and suddenly the answer didn't seem so clear, anymore.

And yet, somehow it was. “Yeah,” Keith answered confidently. “Yeah, we are.”

* * *

The new school year started, and with it came a new school.

Middle school was not as bad as either of them had feared it would be, and after the first few weeks, when everyone was still getting used to locker combinations and having different teachers teaching each subject, sixth grade started to feel almost exactly like the fifth grade.

The only downside was that Keith and Lance no longer had assigned seats next to each other. In protest, Lance picked up his desk and physically moved it into the narrow space between Keith and his neighbor, refusing to move it until the social studies teacher made him spend the rest of the period in the hallway while he moved it back himself.

Lance changed tactics, choosing instead to holler at Keith across the room at the top of his lungs, stopping only when the teachers brought out the threat of detention. He did this every day for about a week, until one day, during math:

“HEY, KEITH, WHAT DID YOU GET FOR NUMBER SEVEN?!”

Keith looked up from the pop quiz and stared the teacher dead in the eye. “I swear I don't know who he is,” he said flatly.

Lance made exaggerated choking noises and fell dramatically out of his chair.

Lance switched to passing notes after that. He folded paper airplanes and threw them at Keith, and the teachers would intercept them and threaten to read them aloud. At this point, Lance would slap his hands to the sides of his face and form his mouth into an 'o' shape giving him a laughable resemblance to Munch's _The Scream_ and yell out, “No, anything but that!”

Each teacher only fell for it once, but Lance used the notes to the best of his advantage.

“'Versailles? More like Ver-SIGH.' I don't get paid enough for this.”

“'Always, I wanna be with you, and make-believe with you, and live in harmony, harmony-' oh, come on!”

“This is just a drawing of a giant robot punching a spaceship.”

Finally, the teachers caved, in what Keith imagined to be a secret meeting held after school hours to discuss The Lance Problem, and Lance was allowed to sit next to Keith, if only because they figured he couldn't behave any worsen than he already was.

Keith wasn't entirely sure how they survived that school year without getting detention once, but somehow they pulled through.

They still met up on the hilltop every night when the weather was clear. Lance's need to smother the silence with conversation had dissipated long ago, and now they spent most nights in silence, though the nights when Lance told him stories were still Keith's favorite.

Keith wanted so badly for that place to be real. He continued to wish upon his favorite star, on the rarer and rarer times when it was out, but he was beginning to wonder if his words could even reach the stars, so far above him.

When he was younger, it was so easy to believe that wishes were magic, and not just the broken pleas of the desperate. But as time wore on, and he watched the stars blink out of existence while he was powerless to stop it, he started to wonder if maybe he was wrong. And the more he wondered, the less he believed, until one day, he was only wishing on the stars out of habit, though the words behind them held no meaning.

Everyone had to grow up sometime.

* * *

It was the beginning of the seventh grade, and they were doing a unit on astronomy. It was just the basics, the names of the planets in the solar system, gravity, and the like. It was all stuff that Keith had already learned years ago, in his hunger to learn more about the stars his mother loved so much. As such, he was doodling in his notebook while the teacher gave the same stale string of excuses for why stars vanished from the sky when a voice to his left spoke up.

“They're going out because people don't wish on stars anymore.”

Keith's head shot up to see Lance, staring resolutely at the teacher.

The teacher chuckled. “Well, that's certainly an interesting theory.”

“It's not a theory, it's the truth,” Lance insisted, his jaw set firmly.

“Dude, are you serious?” one of the other students piped up.

“Yeah, nobody believes in that crap anymore,” another one chimed in.

The teacher held her hands up in a placating gesture. “Now, class-”

“I bet he still believes in Santa Clause, too!” a student in the back jeered.

“It's not fake!” Lance slammed his fist on his desk angrily. “There's a kingdom up there and the stars can make dreams come true, but they need people to make wishes, otherwise they don't have enough magic to make it happen! Without wishes, they don't have enough light to shine and they burn out!” There was an undertone of desperation to Lance's voice, and Keith could tell by the shaky way he clenched his fists that he was trying not to cry. It was perplexing. He knew Lance wished on stars, but he didn't know he believed so strongly in all the stories.

The entire class was laughing now, and the teacher was trying frantically to get them under control. “Class, please. Now, Lance, there's no reason to get so worked up, just please-”

“No!” Lance stood up from his desk so violently that his chair went crashing to the floor. “There is reason to get worked up, didn't you hear me? The stars are dying!”

The class was in an uproar and the teacher's attempts to silence them were proving futile. “Lance, sit down! I know that such beliefs were common a long time ago, and I'll admit, I loved those fairy tales, too, when I was a kid, but that's all they are- _fairy tales_. There comes a time when we all need to grow up and accept reality.”

Lance did not sit down. “Why?” he demanded.

“Because we've learned things about the world. We're more evolved now.”

“Why does being evolved mean you have to forget about magic, and dreams, and wishes. This world is an amazing place, full of so much wonder and joy, how can you all not see that? Keith does!”

Immediately, Keith felt the attention of the entire class shift to him. The uproar stopped suddenly, as the class took in this new information. Whispers floated around the room, and Keith looked at Lance in horror.

Lance turned to him, oblivious to the panic rising in Keith's gut. “Keith, tell them.”

Keith didn't know what to say. “I- I- Uh-” he stammered, glancing around the room, desperately trying to find a way out of this situation.

“Lance.” The teacher was reaching her limit.

“Keith wishes on stars, too!”

“Alright, both of you go to the principal's office.”

“That's not-”

“Now!” the teacher said firmly.

Lance stared her down for a solid minute longer, then he bent down and picked up his overturned chair and his bag. He set the chair back in it's place, swung the bag over his shoulder, then marched to the door, slamming it behind him.

“You, too, Keith,” the teacher said when Keith made no sign of moving.

“But, I didn't-” Keith tried to protest, but was cut off.

“I will not have any more disruptions. You go, too.”

Numbly, Keith grabbed his bag and trudged over to the door. He found Lance waiting for him in the hall.

“I can't believe this!” Lance cried. “How can they all sit there and act all high and mighty like they know everything?! It just- It makes me so mad! God! A few hundred years ago people wished on stars all the time, and those wishes came true! What the hell changed?”

Keith, still reeling in shock over what had just happened, said nothing.

“And what the teacher said? About accepting reality? What a load of bull! Just because there are things that people don't understand, it doesn't make them any less real! I mean, people have faith in God and stuff, why should magic be any different? It's like people have lost all sense of wonder. It's just sad, really.”

Lance turned to look at Keith and noticed the dark expression on his face.

“Aw, hell,” Lance said cracking a grin. “It doesn't matter, though. They're all just idiots, right?”

Lance reached out to put a comforting hand on Keith's shoulder, but Keith immediately slapped it away.

Lance looked surprised. “Keith, what's wrong, man?”

“What's wrong?” Keith echoed hollowly. He could feel rage boiling up from his center. “What's wrong with _me_?” The anger reached the surface, and he stepped close to Lance, shoving a finger in his face. “What's wrong with _you_?”

Lance held up his hands defensively. “What? I-”

“I share something personal with you, and you think it's okay to throw it out there, for everyone to hear?”

“Dude, it's not that big a deal!” Lance argued.

“Not that big a deal?! You-” Keith's rage went white hot and he swung his fist and it connected hard with Lance's cheek, sending the other boy stumbling backwards.

Lance reached up to touch the spot where Keith had hit him. His shock quickly turned to anger, and with a gutteral cry, he launched himself at Keith, tackling his waist and sending them both crashing against the opposite wall.

“It's not like you ever said it was supposed to be some sort of secret!” Lance spat, as he shoved Keith into the wall again.

“You don't know anything!” Keith growled as he grappled with Lance. “You run around pretending to be a prince with your secret missions, and you live in Oz, or Neverland, or wherever, like everything's just some sort of game! But it's not! There are real world consequences! This isn't like one of your dumb fairy tales!” he finally got the upper hand, and shoved Lance into the lockers on the other side of the hall. Lance doubled over in pain, but Keith marched up to him and grabbed the collar of his shirt in his fists, forcing him to stand up straight.

Lance's eyes were still wild from the fight, but now they held a hint of confusion as well. “What do you mean 'fairy tales?' You believe in them, too! You wish on stars, you believe in them!”

“No I don't!” Keith all but roared. “I mean- God- I don't know! I wish on stars, sure! But the rest? It's just a bunch of children's stories! I stopped believing it! Haven't you?!”

All the fight immediately left Lance's eyes. Something akin to pain momentarily flashed across his face, but then he dropped his head so his bangs shielded his eyes and his expression turned neutral.

Keith's grip on Lance's shirt weakened. It was strange, seeing Lance's face completely devoid of all emotion, and something about it chilled him to his very core, making him regret his words. He could feel things falling apart under his fingers, but he didn't even know how to begin grasping at the pieces to hold them together.

“Come on,” Lance said, removing Keith's hands from his shirt. He shoved his hands in his pockets and headed off down the hall, avoiding eye contact with Keith the whole time. “They're gonna send someone after us soon if we don't show up.”

As they sat in the chair's outside the principal's office waiting to be called in, Lance didn't even so much as glance at Keith once. The silence was a wall between them, and even though they were only sitting a few short feet apart, the distance seemed to stretch on for miles.

A part of Keith felt guilty, though he wasn't entirely sure about what. When he told Lance he didn't believe all of the stories, he had reacted a lot stronger than Keith had expected him to, and it confused him. He felt like he had broken some sort of unspoken promise between the two of them and he wanted desperately to apologize.

However, the part of him that was still angry silenced the guilty part, until it was just a dull murmur in the back of his mind. Lance had broken his trust, even if he did so unintentionally, and that was not something that Keith could just forgive.

After what seemed like an eternity of awkward, strained silence, they were finally called into the principal's office.

As they shuffled in, the principle was leafing through two folders on her desk. Without looking up, she gestured for them to take a seat in the chairs opposite her desk. Keith fidgeted nervously as he waited for her to speak. The hijinks he got into with Lance usually got them in trouble with their teachers, but they had never actually been sent to the principal's office before.

“So,” she said finally, closing the folders and looking up at them. “I understand you two disrupted class by talking about... wishing stars?”

Keith's anxiety reached it's peak and he couldn't take it anymore. “Please don't call my foster parents!” he blurted out.

For the first time since their fight in the hallway, Lance glanced over at Keith, shock, then realization dawning on his face. As soon as Keith noticed him looking, though, he schooled his features and diverted his gaze to the principal's desk.

The principal smiled softly. “I'm not going to call anyone.”

Keith could feel all the tension leave his body and he slumped back against the chair, relieved.

“Now,” she began, her expression turning more serious. “While we do encourage students to express their opinions, we ask them to do so in a way that is respectful to the teachers and not disruptful to the class.”

Lance began muttering angrily under his breath.

“Since neither of you have been sent to the office in the past, I will let you off with a warning this time. _However,_ ” she paused and shot a warning look at Lance, who immediately shut up. “If anything like this happens again, it will result in detention. Am I clear?”

Keith and Lance both nodded and mumbled out, “Yes, ma'am.”

Satisfied, the principal motioned for them to stand up. “Alright, you two can go back to class now. I don't want to see either of you in here again, though, got it?”

The walk back to class was a quiet one. Lance seemed to have snapped out of whatever mood he had been in that had left him vacant and indifferent and now seemed to be deep in thought instead.

Keith, still angry, made a point to stay ten paces ahead of the other boy.

They returned to the classroom amid a chorus of murmured chatter and hushed laughter. Keith could feel his classmates' eyes on him, like a paranoid prickling sensation crawling up his body, as he made a beeline for his desk. When he was seated, though, he chanced a glance around the room and found that most of the attention was drawn towards Lance, who sat so far hunched over his notebook that it looked like he was trying to curl in on himself. He wore that same stubbornly angry look from before and rested a hand on his forehead, shielding his eyes from the rest of the class. Keith realized with stark clarity that they were wet and rimmed with red.

Keith hadn't even noticed Lance crying. It must have happened on the way back from the principal's office. The part of him that felt guilty screamed at him, beating tiny fists against Keith's anger, trying to break it down.

But then he heard the whispers, low and dark, the words twisting around his head like snakes creeping their way under his skin, openly cruel in the way only middle schoolers could be.

“ _Oh, great the babies are back.”_

“ _Starting a fight over wishing on stars? Haha, what freaks.”_

“ _Never expected it from Lance. That Keith kid was always weird though.”_

“ _I bet he spread it to Lance.”_

“ _Haha, better watch out, weirdness is contagious! Sit too close to him and it'll rub off on you, too.”_

The anger rose up again, hard and fast like a tidal wave, swallowing Keith whole until there was no room anymore for guilt. He kept his head down and did not look up until school let out, not even when Lance raised his hand to be sent to the nurse and didn't return.

* * *

He got home and found a note on his pillow. It simply said 'I'm sorry.' Keith stared at it for a moment in disbelief. Did Lance really think that would be enough? He crumpled it up and tossed it into the garbage, putting it out of his mind.

A part of him knew it might appear that he was overreacting. After all, Lance didn't intend for Keith to get teased. And he didn't know that being teased for wishing on stars was the one that that could hurt Keith worst of all. But just because Lance didn't know, didn't mean that it hurt any less. And for Keith, anger was easier than forgiveness.

That night, when he turned off his light and got in bed, he looked up at the ceiling to find that it was dotted with plastic glow-in-the-dark stars. He stared at them confused, until he recalled the note on his pillow. It hadn't been the entirety of Lance's apology, after all.

He stared at the stars and felt peaceful. But then, he remembered the stares of his classmates when Lance told them he wished on stars, he remembered the whispered voices as they returned to the classroom, but most of all, he remembered Lance's vacant expression after he had told him that he no longer believed.

Keith threw back the sheets and launched himself from his bed, grabbing his desk chair and standing on it so that he could reach the ceiling. He tore down the stars, one by one, ripping at them so forcefully that he snapped one in half. When he was finished, he gathered them up from where he had hurled them on the floor and dumped them into an old shoebox that he had found beneath his bed.

It hurt, realizing he was just as angry at himself as he was at Lance.


End file.
